Dreeeeeam, dream dream dream~

Toni at Kaonashi Ga Suki posed an interesting question in her blog.

She asked:

1.) Where do you see yourself a year from now?
2.) Where would you like to see yourself a year from now?

Those are pretty deep questions -- they appear to be asking the same thing, but really, they are completely different questions! I've been thinking about it, and it's just really hard for me to differentiate between where I realistically see myself, and where I would like to see myself. I think that says that I am an optimistic person! Or just too realistic to dream outside the box.

As you know, my petition to change my immigration status had been rejected. As I am doing this process over, I am kind of in no man's land. I'm not legal, but I'm not illegal. It's very gray-ish. Well, I had been given a year to provisionally roam in this no man's land for a year thanks to the school's issuance of a new I-20 for one year. This one year started last month. As you may also remember, I had gone through some difficult times, specifically, last spring-ish. Last March, April, and May were spent in agony, and by June I was completely lost. (Note that I had lost over 10lbs without even trying and lost fistfulls of hair on a daily basis.) Well, if this current crisis is not resolved, then I will be spending next spring in similar agony.

The good news in answering this question is, though, that by October of next year, the agony will be long gone, no matter the outcome. If immigration chooses to reject me once more, I would have to make a choice by next June (2005), so I will be living a completely different life in October, 2005, perhaps as an approved alien (gotta love that word) or perhaps as a ostracized illegal alien. But one negative thing will remain, and that is that I will still be an alien.

I remain optimistic. As an American, I am cynical of my country's systems, but I have still a slight faith in the fact that our system works. It's not much of a reasoning, but it is what keeps me going (notice how fragile and delicate that reasoning is!). So realistically, in one year, I'll either be at a nursing program with an approved visa, or, if fate twists and turns like it has been all my life, I may be living in the US as I am now, getting no where in my education, and without an approved visa, hence dwelling illegally. Or I may possibly be deported, to Korea perhaps. I may be in a serious depression when that happens.

Ideally, I'd like to see myself with an approved visa, and attending a nursing program, wherever that may be, and that alone is taking giant leaps into becoming a US citizen/permanent resident. I'd be ecstatic if that were to come true. Hell, I'd even go far as to say that I'd be living the life. I'd be having a ball anyways.

So that question extends beyond the one year mark. What about in five years? Ten years? I think five years from now is probably going to be my turning point. During the next five years I hope to finish up my bachelor's and go on to graduate school. The transition will happen within those five years, I believe. And dammit, I believe. I want to believe. What graduate school I will go to has a tremendous effect on my life. It's weird that even though I have my major decided (set in stone!) graduate school poses a field of various possibilities for me.

Number one choice, of course, is still medical school. I am still set on going on a crusade to fight AIDS/HIV. Be the humanitarian I have always wanted to be. Secondly, I may go to graduate school to get an advanced degree in nursing. That may also give me the power to go abroad and see the world and support humanitarian efforts, but not as much as an MD. It would also get me in the door to teach, which is one of the things I'd like to eventually get around doing! Becoming a nursing instructor sounds excellent -- it would add to my income as a practicing nurse, and I'll be impacting new nurses to be, hopefully in a positive way.

Another option is studying Public Health. I think that's pretty self explanatory given what I've already stated. Another is just plain English. But you probably saw that one coming.

Lennon was right. He's not the only dreamer. I am a professional dreamer. It makes me extremely happy to dream and dream. I feel like a teenager -- these types of things might be something much pondered over in one's adolescent years. My twistings and turnings of fate has me questioning my every step and every plan, but it's certainly given me a different insight on life's mysterious workings. Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a dream.